Back when I started grammar school, my first lunchbox was a BONANZA. I recall wondering why there were 4 guys pictured on it instead of 3. See, Adam had left before I ever watched (or was old enough to remember him).
As I recall, BONANZA was always on opposite THE ED SULLIVAN SHOW. We used to watch ED SULLIVAN religiously. Which means, there's a good chance we only really watched BONANZA during the summer reruns. I don't think there were any reruns of ED SULLIVAN, so much of it was tied up in being a live show, when it was off, they put something else on, a "summer replacement". (One such year was a show starring the folk group THE LIMELITERS! Nobody but me seems to remember ever seeing this, but I clearly recall the show's "theme song" being an edited version of "Jehosephat", the opening song from their SING OUT! album.)
It was sometime in the 90's I rented a pair of "best of" BONANZA tapes. Even at the time, I found myself really wishing they'd been all from thbe 1st season, in sequence. The 1st episode was so different from the others. The show started with a running sub-plot (no idea how long this went on) about a group of local businessmen who wanted to buy part of the Ponderosa so they could send a logging team in for the lumber. Ben Cartright objected to this in the strongest possible terms on almost religious reasons. So the family was very paranoid, protective, even belligerent toward any strangers wandering onto or across their land, and Virginia City was seen as a dangerous place to visit. This was not the homey, friendly relationship I'd known from all the later stories.
So the businessmen came up with a scheme... they recruited an actress, who they hoped would entice Little Joe to come to town. Once there, while she distracted him, they'd capture him, and hold him prisoner to FORCE Ben to agree to sell part of his land. ONly it didn't quite work. Little Joe WAS taken with her, but, not enough that he didn't SEE what was really going on. And the thing is, he was SUCH a gentleman, he didn't blame her for the set-up! And his attitude REALLY touched her, and she got very angry at the men who employed her. Meanwhile, a group of thugs broke into her room to grab Joe, but he was expecting them, and actually had FUN fighting them off and escaping, making them all look like fools.
Man! How could not admire the hell out of a guy like that?
I wouldn't mind seeing the show one of these days, if I could watch ALL the episodes from the beginning.